Fiery Hearts
by seekerchasing
Summary: "Lightwoods," Magnus said. "They always have to have the last word."- Kissed, Cassandra Clare. Drabbles revolving around the inner thoughts of the youngest generation of Lightwoods.
1. isabelle

Isabelle knows she has been a Shadowhunter all her life. She knows how to fight, to keep going, to not fall or fail. It is who she is. She also knows that she's Isabelle Lightwood. She's beautiful, untouchable, invulnerable and above all, a fighter.

She fights to be as good as the boys at slaying demons. She fights to pretend that the world doesn't hurt her. Sometimes she fights so those dumb boys she loves so much will eat the damn food she cooked for them, preferably without complaint. Cooking isn't really her greatest skill. She'd like to see one of them try for once.

Like any Shadowhunter, family is important to her. If that makes her proud, so be it. If it means she thinks herself superior to mundanes... that's probably true as well. More than anything, she loves her brothers and wants to protect them. Alec from other people, Jace from himself and Max... well, she knows she's too late to protect Max from anything and that she will never forget. She won't forgive herself either, no matter what the others say because she was his big sister and all he had was that stupid toy.

Isabelle knows she finds herself in love a little too easily. Not love-love like Jace and Clary or Alec and Magnus but a less complicated, less consuming version that is, in the end rather easy to throw aside.

She thinks maybe she got her ideas of love from watching Jace and Alec struggle and hurt for years but now they're finally happy and Isabelle wonders if she might be missing out. Sometimes she looks at Simon and wonders but then, she's Isabelle Lightwood and she doesn't know how to fall. She remembers how she felt when she found out about what was truly between her parents. Isabelle had discovered what love could do and she didn't want any part of it. She still doesn't.

She'll never admit it to anyone but she's scared. She's scared because all she knows is sometimes she hates Maia, and even Clary because _what if he still loves Clary? _And maybe she does want to go against her instincts, and her years of training and just let herself fall. Simon makes her feel unsure but so-so happy and maybe it is love-love because it's a little like the way she feels when she's soaring through the air about to decapitate a demon with her golden whip. Is it love? Isabelle doesn't know. She does know that would probably sound like a strange comparison to a mundane (and yes she knows that expression makes her sound conceited) but that is when she feels the most like Isabelle.


	2. jace

One of the most defining moments of Jace's life is the day he doesn't know his name. It's not defining because of the recent events: the death of his father (who he now knows isn't his father, and who he really should be calling Valentine), or the discovery that angel blood runs through his veins or that he is actually the son of Stephen Herondale. It's not the overwhelming relief he feels at not being part-demon or not being Clary's brother. It's not even the fact that he died today and would still be dead if Clary hadn't resurrected him with the help of the Angel Raziel. Well, maybe he should say that it's not _just _because of the recent events.

He doesn't know his name. It's the simplest fact a person can know about themselves. Identity is the one thing you carry with you all your life but really, Jace wonders, has he ever had it? Wayland, Morgenstern, Herondale. He can't get it out of his head. It is what is keeping him away from the celebrations, keeping him away from finally being at Clary's side, the way he wants to be. The way he finally can be, without hating himself.

Maybe one day looking back Jonathon Christopher Jace Wayland Morgenstern Herondale Lightwood will find this funny, maybe it will be a time to remember, the day he figured himself out but right now... not so much.

He can't be Jonathon Christopher. It's a stolen name, one Valentine gave to him by accident, one he doesn't want because it is associated with the boy he hates - Clary's real brother, his father's real son - who killed Max (and nearly them all). He has been Jace for a long time now, and Maryse, the woman who he thinks of as a mother, was the one to give it to him. He can't deny Jace suits him far more then Jonathon Christopher ever will.

He was Wayland for the first ten years of his life but it never really belonged to him. It was part of Valentine's plot so really all the time where he thought he was happy, with his father was all a lie. He hadn't even been Valentine's only son. Who he had been then was part of the past anyway. He wasn't that boy anymore.

After his father's supposed death he had still thought himself a Wayland. He hadn't known then. He was damaged and fragile and thought himself invincible. Or maybe he hadn't, but either way he hadn't cared. He was going to kill as many demons as he could and he would make his father proud. He would pay back the monsters who had murdered his father. He also had a new family. Alec, his parabatai, his foster brother and Izzy, his foster sister. Max, a little brother to protect, a little boy who hero-worshipped him. Maryse and Hodge and Robert. All that he needed, as he had once told Clary. People he loved, still loved.

Clary had come next. Jace had never thought he would feel so strongly about one person, that he could feel so much. And then so soon, after that brief happiness the truth, or at least the next version of lies, had come out. He was Clary's brother. What had felt so right, so natural was really the worst kind of wrong. He was a Morgenstern. Valentine's son. His father was not Michael Wayland. His father had faked his own death and left Jace alone.

It had been the most painful time of Jace's life. His father was not a hero, but a murderer. Jace had failed to retrieve the Mortal Cup and he had been to weak to kill Valentine while he had the chance. And worst of all, he and Clary could never be together the way he wanted. She had already moved on, with Simon the mundane of all people, while he couldn't. Could never love anyone but her.

Finally, after pointless deaths, pain and unhappiness caused by Valentine the real truth had been revealed. He wasn't related to Clary. He was the son of Stephen and Celine Herondale and he had been cut from his dead mother's womb as a baby because he was one of Valentine's precious experiments. Then Valentine had pretended for years to be his father. Everything he had known was a lie. Now it was all over.

Valentine was dead. Jace was so confused and he couldn't just let it go. Once, Valentine had been a father to him and he still loved him. Maybe he always would. Just because Stephen Herondale was his biological father and someone had handed him a bunch of letters he had written when he was alive didn't mean Jace could suddenly think of him as a father. It didn't make Jace a Herondale.

Jace supposed he could make up a new last name for himself. Maybe he could be Fray or Bane, after all Clary actually was a Morgenstern so she didn't really need that made-up name of hers anymore Then again, it was unlikely she would want to be connected to Valentine. Bane meant "misery" which fit him just as much as it did Magnus and Jace thinks, if Magnus really loves Alec surely he wouldn't mind sharing with Alec's family... of course, they were hardly new names made up with the extreme wit of Jace whoever-the-hell-he-is.

And then he sees Clary. She is all he wants and now they can be together and no one can say that it is wrong. They talk for the first time since it all happened and she is nervous and unsure that he still wants her. As if he could ever stop. As if he would ever want to. Together they fit, they make sense, and he makes sense. He knows who he is, when he is with Clary. Of course, she does have to spell it out for him.

"Oh, please." She says. "You're Jace Lightwood. You know that."

And he does.


	3. max

Max is happy living at the Institute. He has two big brothers and one sister. He has his parents and his tutor and his cat, Church. Everyone says Church belongs to everyone and anyone who lives at the Institute but Max knows better. His parents are annoying and they always drag him with them whenever they leave the Institute as if he isn't old enough to stay behind with the others. He loves them anyway.

He loves Izzy with her crazy, colourful outfits and her warm, comforting hugs. Of course he doesn't always understand her loud, angry arguments with their mum and dad and he hates how she always treats him like a baby but Izzy is the best big sister in the world (even though her cooking really stinks).

Then there is Alec, who he loves too, though he is even worse than Izzy at ruining Max's fun and leaving him behind to go off and have adventures. Alec is the oldest though and he looks after them all. Max knows nothing will happen to him or Izzy or Jace if Alec is protecting them so it's much easier to let them go without him. Of course, when Max grows up he will be the one to keep them safe.

Jace is his hero, and he loves him because Jace understands. Jace lets Max join in on their training sometimes and secretly helps him do some of the more dangerous (and totally wicked) stunts. Sometime he even gets in trouble for it, but Jace doesn't care because he can charm their mum into letting him off for anything. Max wishes he could do that too. He won't help Max draw on any runes, even though Max has told him it's extremely hypocritical of him as he was Max's age when he got his first marks. Jace just laughs and goes hunting with Alec. They are parabatai, which is really cool. One day Max will have a parabatai too. He wonders who it will be and daydreams about all the adventures they will have.

What they all need to learn is that Max can slay demons too, and he will. As soon as he gets taller, he will be out there with them. He will finally be part of the team and nothing is going to get in his way.

Until then Max can admit to himself he is quite happy to trail Hodge around the library asking questions. Hodge is his tutor and he knows everything. There is nothing Max enjoys quite so much as finding out the answers to the millions of questions that run around his head. Max loves learning, and he longs for the day that he gets to put all his knowledge to good use.


	4. alec

They won't accept him. It's what he fears most. They could hate him or kick him out of the Institute. Where else would he go? He doesn't know a life outside shadowhunting. He doesn't have anywhere else to go, anywhere else he wants to be.

His parents, Maryse and Robert. He honestly can't see a future where they know. Or maybe he can and that's the problem. He can't see them being introduced to his boyfriend. He can't see himself introducing them to his boyfriend; honestly, he can barely think the word in his head. He can't see them being welcoming or loving or even polite about it. His parents will hate him. They will disown him; they will wish he was never born. How can he tell them, knowing what he knows?

Max is so young. Does he even know what the word gay means? Somehow Alec thinks not. Shadowhunters, for all that they are raised for a hard life of killing and scars, as Hodge always says, can be quite remarkably sheltered. Max, he thinks, would look to their parents and follow their example. This is something else he cannot stand. His little brother, who he will always love and protect, looking at him with disgust and shame... Alec thinks he would never be able to live through that.

Izzy knows. It's comforting to know he has someone who loves him so much nothing else matters. She doesn't care who he loves or is attracted to, she just wants him to be happy. She tries so hard to make it happen but even Isabelle Lightwood can't make the world revolve around her. So, in her own way she tries to help. She dates all kinds of wacky, disturbing individuals. Werewolves, vampires, faeries... anyone who is going to attract all the wrong kind of attention for a respectable young Shadowhunter. Anyone their parents would hate. Anyone who would take the attention away from him.

Jace doesn't know. Jace can't know. Parabatai, brothers in arms... best friends. They don't mean enough for Alec. Jace is... straight. Quite possibly, the straightest person Alec has ever met. He burns brighter than anyone Alec knows. When he is around Jace, Alec is so much brighter and somehow it is the best and by far the worst feeling in the world. If Alec has his way Jace will never know.

Somehow, _she_ has found out. How Alec has no clue as he has guided his secret so carefully even the person he loves most has no idea. He supposes Izzy could have told... no, he knows Izzy protects his secret more fiercely than he does because she knows the decision to tell people is his. This girl, this stupid, insignificant girl who has somehow invaded their lives, knows. Clary. He knows, in the tiny, unbiased part of his mind that he could actually like Clary if he couldn't see the effect she had on Jace. The way he was so attentive, he actually cared about her. He never cared about any girl, which why Alec had found it somewhat easier to accept his feelings would always be unrequited. For the first time Jace had found a girl who wasn't just a game to him. Well, he was still Jace Wayland so he was still playing a game. But for once, it meant something. Even Clary's mundane friend could see it.

And then there is Magnus Bane. The newest person in Alec's life. Alec doesn't even know him, not really. He isn't the newest person in Alec's life, he definitely isn't; he doesn't know why he even just said that he was. And Alec doesn't want him in there at all. He really doesn't. Magnus is colourful, and shocking. He keeps calling Alec Alexander (Alec really doesn't know why this sticks in his head). He's obviously a crazy person, a downworlder who throws huge and wild parties for cats. Who does that? Not Alec and not anyone Alec knows. He is intriguing though. Magnus Bane has hidden depths. Of course Alec will never see them. Why would he?


End file.
